> I'm not a heavy gamer but my understanding is that a surprising number of popular games run just fine on Linux, thanks in part to the WINE community and the efforts of Valve.

True but at a loss of performance compared to running the game natively on Windows.

But my problem wouldn't be with games, it would be with software I either use professionally or out of personal interest. Visual Studio, Photoshop, Lightroom, 3D Max.